2019 Fandom Promo!

[crantz]

Welcome to the Fandom Promo post, everyone!

Here's where you get those eyes on your fandoms for sign ups!

Share what makes your Yuletide fandoms the shiniest and why you love them. A big part of Yuletide is how small our fandoms can be, and this is a good way to make sure other people know what gems there are out there!

Suggested form to use:

<b>FANDOM NAME</b>:
<b>WHAT MAKES IT GREAT</b>:
<b>WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional)</b>:


For reference, last year's promo post!

This post on LJ

Comments

[doranwen]

FANDOM NAME: C-16: FBI

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT:

- Only one season! On Youtube! Easy to binge-watch. :D

- Team dynamics! Newbies along with experienced team members with all the usual interpersonal friction.

- At least a couple women, including a much younger Angie Harmon from Rizzoli & Isles fame. The guy in charge of the unit is played by Julia Roberts' brother Eric.

- Excellent procedural that feels *very* different from most. The cases are intertwined with interpersonal things (which sometimes turn into cases and vice versa), there are arcs (both personal and professional) that are touched on in various episodes throughout the season, and the episodes don't always end happy and perfect. Sometimes they're mixed, sometimes down, sometimes up. You never know. (I feel like in some ways, the show didn't make it because it was too complex for the viewer that wants everything simple and happy ending. A show ahead of its time, perhaps?)

- Romance potential on multiple fronts. The show doesn't do all that much with it - which is where fanfic needs to take over!

- Unusually for an FBI show, no serial killers. If you're squicked by serial killers, you can watch this safely. Cases involve bank robberies, kidnapping, mafia, drugs, hostage situations, assassinations… but no serial killers.

- A nonexistent fandom, but one very enthusiastic fan who will read whatever you write! (And there are more who like it.) You can shape the fandom how you like. :D


WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): YOUTUBE!

[kultiras]

FANDOM NAME: Pantene Rescue Shots “Just Landed” Commercial

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Okay, technically this is a commercial for a hair care product. But really, this is a quartet of ladies who are a team of thieves! Imagine the potential for heists! Clearly they’re a team who work together well and get the job done. Idk this commercial has been stuck in my head since December, and I just needed to share it with you all.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): On YouTube!

Just Landed: Pantene Rescue Shots, straight from Brazil directed by Joachim Zunke from Story: We Produce on Vimeo.

Sims 4 LP: Wedding Rags to Island Riches

[lea_hazel]

FANDOM NAME: The Sims 4: Wedding Rags to Island Riches

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: This is a series of TS4 "let's play" type videos themed around the "Island Living" expansion and the fan-created "rags to riches" challenge. It's 100% free to watch and/but poses a serious risk of kindling a desire to play many hours of TS4.

Features: a rags-to-riches self-made Cinderella plot, amnesia, heartwarming friendship, DIY home-building, lots of plant appreciation, a scintillating forbidden romance with a merman of questionable ethics, Mysterious! Past! and much, much more.

There are currently fifty videos in the series, each 20-30 minutes long, and Seri (the vidder) has hundreds of other Sims videos, including a three generation legacy that's been going since TS4 first came out.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbgqvuoYGITeFNopq0F2pxceQyI4oPREL

Mrs. Martin's Incomparable Adventure

[fairestcat]

FANDOM NAME: Mrs. Martin's Incomparable Adventure - Courtney Milan
WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: It's a regency f/f romance novella in which two delightful heroines from different social classes join forces to get revenge on a terrible man. Oh, and the heroines are 73 and 69 respectively.

The official synopsis:

Mrs. Bertrice Martin—a widow, some seventy-three years young—has kept her youthful-ish appearance with the most powerful of home remedies: daily doses of spite, regular baths in man-tears, and refusing to give so much as a single damn about her Terrible Nephew.

Then proper, correct Miss Violetta Beauchamps, a sprightly young thing of nine and sixty, crashes into her life. The Terrible Nephew is living in her rooming house, and Violetta wants him gone.

Mrs. Martin isn’t about to start giving damns, not even for someone as intriguing as Miss Violetta. But she hatches another plan—to make her nephew sorry, to make Miss Violetta smile, and to have the finest adventure of all time.

If she makes Terrible Men angry and wins the hand of a lovely lady in the process? Those are just added bonuses.

Because it's a novella it's a very quick read. The ebook is listed as 144 pages.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): It's available from all the usual ebook retailers for $2.24 US/$2.99 CAD. There's also a paperback for $5.99. The author's website has purchase links and an excerpt which gives a very good idea of the tone of the story.

[stelleappese]

FANDOM NAME: Padmaavat

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: I'm not gonna lie, some people may enjoy it for the epic love story, some may like historical fiction, or war movies, some may enjoy the gorgeous aesthetic of the movie.
I'm here for the bad dudes.

Or, to be precise, I'm here for One Bad Dude Being Hopelessly In Love With The Other Bad Dude.

If like me you like show-stealing performances by the bad guys, sidekicks who show their love by immediately murdering people just because their beloved boss asked them to, and super-angsty unrequited queer love, this is the movie for you. Just, you know, don't expect any historical accuracy lol

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): It should be available on Prime Video.

[reflectedeve]

FANDOM NAME: A Song For A New Day - Sarah Pinsker

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Rock’n’roll, rebellion and community organizing in a dystopian near-future of shut-ins and near-total corporate homogenization.

Luce Cannon, a queer ex-Orthdox-Jewish rock star, was riding the wave of her first hit when the attacks started; first there were bombings in high-occupancy settings like ballparks on game day, and then the onset of a deadly and highly contagious pandemic. Survivors were scared indoors, “congregation laws” were passed to prohibit large gatherings, and America became a nation of shut-ins who lived the majority of their lives via online/drone-delivered consumerism. Musicians either signed with a monolithic corporation to play virtual “concerts” within approved demographic and aesthetic parameters, or they went underground, forming secret rock clubs in basements and abandoned warehouses, dodging curews and police. And years after the threats are over, these corporations really don’t want anyone to mess with the status quo … but they do always need new musical acts to package and sell.

Rosemary Laws was just a kid when the Crash hit, and she’s grown up living an isolated life with her parents in a tiny farm town, rarely venturing outside their own property. School was virtual, and so is her job as a highly competent customer service rep for SuperWally, a corporation so ubiquitous that most transactions are handled with their own in-house digital currency. But everything changes when she scores a free ticket to a digital rock show, and she finds herself getting recruited as a talent scout for the nation’s biggest digital music label/concert producer; a job that comes with travel, investigation, and exposure to more people than she has ever met in real life in her life. It’s a sort of small-town-girl meets city life story, but with a lot more agency and moral complexity on the girl’s part.

Romance, betrayal, freedom, accessibility, and different generations finding common ground: there’s so much to dig into here, and it’s such a fun ride!

WHERE TO FIND IT: Bookstores, libraries and e-book sellers of all kinds! This is a new release, so on the one hand, it’s probably everywhere. (On the other, there might be a decent wait at the library.)

[reflectedeve]

FANDOM NAME: In The Vanishers’ Palace - Aliette de Bodard

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Lesbian dragon/human master/indentured servant slow build romance with built-in (older/teen) kidfic. I mean, come on.

In a post-alien-invasion dystopian future where individuals need to prove their value to the community to survive, Yên sacrifices herself for her aging mother, and is sold to the dragon Vu Côn, who puts her to work as a tutor to her two children. Vu Côn is strange and terrifying, and so is her home--which was created and inhabited by the former invaders, the Vanishers--but oddly compelling, and the strange attraction is mutual. But learning to understand and trust each other is complicated by secrets, Yên’s longing for her home and family, and the struggle to heal humanity from the many strange plagues the Vanishers left behind. All this in 145 pages, but there’s plenty to expand on (especially with the romance).

WHERE TO FIND IT: Novellas are often easier to get your hands on digitally, so I’d go for an ebook or audiobook here, probably. (It's short!) My library also has it; maybe yours does too.

[reflectedeve]

FANDOM NAME: The Future of Another Timeline - Annalee Newitz

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: In a world where time travel is a discovery science, an apparently naturally occurring phenomenon known to humanity from the earliest days of civilization, the past is editable. And the Daughters of Harriet, a secret feminist society dedicated to improving history for women and people of color, are finding themselves in the middle of an edit war with a shadowy men’s rights organization. Even worse, these creeps aren’t just trying to change history to take away women’s rights and freedoms--they’re trying to seize total control of access to the process, locking their changes in and freezing the timeline for everyone else. Tess is trying to fight for her version of the future (and an even better version than that), while simultaneously and surreptitiously traveling back to her own early-90s adolescence to try and undo the greatest regret of her life.

In a parallel narrative, Beth is a teen girl and a punk fan in 1993, attempting to navigate adolescence and troubled family dynamics and trauma and youthful romance; not to mention the fact that in her timeline, abortion is illegal throughout the US.

Features riot grrrl bands in California, bellydancers and rogue sex educatiors at the World’s Columbian Exhibition in Chicago in 1893, time travel academics, geology and prehistory, teenage girls murdering rapists and abusers, a rescue mission to save a trans woman from being retroactively murdered in her past, and an alternate history where women and African-Americans won the vote at the same time, and Harriet Tubman was elected to the Senate. There is so. Much. To expand on and explore.

WHERE TO FIND IT: Bookstores, libraries and e-book sellers of all kinds! This is a new release, so on the one hand, it’s probably everywhere. (On the other, there might be a decent wait at the library.) The audiobook version features an original riot grrl song!

[reflectedeve]

FANDOM NAME: The Witch Family - Eleanor Estes

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Amy loves telling stories, mostly to her best friend, Clarissa … and her stories are also true. So when she banishes (or excuse me, “banquishes”) Old Witch to a glass hill for her wickedness, she soon peoples that world with a Little Witch Girl (just her and Clarissa’s age), an invisible spelling bee, little witch classmates, a mermaid friend, a baby sister and more. Amy and Clarissa’s suburban life and the lives and adventures of Little Witch Girl and her friends entwine and interact in unexpected ways, the lines blur between storyteller/characters, enemies, and family, and there is exciting but mild danger and inventive wordplay for all.

It’s a childhood favorite of mine, and as an adult, I’m fascinated by how metatextual the whole thing gets. I want to read and write stories that play with those elements and push them further than the original book does!



WHERE TO FIND IT: This book came out in the 1960s, so it’s probably a better bet for libraries than bookstores. Ebook and audiobook versions are definitely out there too - I think I got them both on Scribd, last year.

[shoemaster]

FANDOM NAME: His Fair Assassins - Robin LeFevers
WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Teen Nun Assassins in Medieval Brittany.

Those are the six words that had me picking up the trilogy about a convent dedicated to the god of death trying to help the young Duchess of Brittany maintain Brittany's independence from France through a little light murder. Conspiracies and romance abound, along with some neat "here are the supplies you'll need for the mission" type scenes that would be straight out of a Bond movie, if it weren't the 1490s.

The world building is a lot of fun with regards to how the "old saints" are worshiped and incorporated against the rising tide of Christianity and how the presence of these religious orders would interact with the known history.

Note: These books keep things pretty PG-13 but there is some attempted sexual violence referenced in the first book, but the second book steps it up with a sexually sadistic and abusive father.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): Your local library or book store of choice!

[hanna_yuki]

FANDOM NAME: Identity V



WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: IdV is an asymmetrical survival horror game, with gothic horror elements and a overall mystery taking place in a cursed mansion. You play as a detective who goes to the abandoned mansion in search of a missing girl and discover diaries detailing a game that took place there. You also find yourself more connected to the mansion itself than you may realize.
The game has a lovely Tim Burton/Coraline-esque art style. With a wide cast of characters, you're bound to find a favorite, be they survivor or hunter. Each carries their own backstory and unique skills to the game. (One of my favs is my icon.)

Just remember, fear always springs from the unknown.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?: The game is available both on mobile (android and IOS) and PC through their website. PC users use a separate server from mobile, which has a hand in longer wait times for matches. You will need a reliable WiFi connection for all platforms.

The medieval political intrigue zombie apocalypse TV series GoT wanted to be

[keerawa]

FANDOM NAME: 킹덤 Kingdom
WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: This is an intense South Korean TV drama filled with gorgeous period costumes, cutthroat politics, plot twists, kick-ass sword fights, and some truly horrifying zombies.

Set during the Joseon period, we soon meet the Crown Prince facing a treason charge, a clever female physician (yes, that's Doona Bae from Sense8!) and a mysterious former soldier on the run. I definitely see M/M and loyalty kink potential.

Season 1 had 6 episodes, ending in an epic cliff-hanger. Season 2 is currently in production.

The Daily Beast loves it: https://www.thedailybeast.com/netflixs-kingdom-an-insane-korean-zombie-epic-that-puts-the-walking-dead-to-shame

The aesthetic is incredible:


Check out the teaser on youtube!

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): Netflix!

from LJ_McKay

[(Anonymous)]

FANDOM NAME: The TRY Channel
WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Irish comedians, pretty much full stop. Basically, Irish people try various foods/shows/experiences from around the world and make quippy commentary about it. There is a fairly small rotating cast, so you get to know individuals' personalities pretty quickly, and they are FUNNY. Good craic, as they say. And they're just 5ish-minute videos with no continuity, so you can start anywhere when you have a second to spare.

Formerly known as "Facts." but there was a whole kerfuffle about the producer ripping off the contributors or something so they broke off and went independent. The fandom is pretty adamant about not watching those old videos but they're still good content.
WHERE CAN I FIND IT?: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCabq3No3wXbs6Ut-Pux6SzA

[spring_gloom]

FANDOM NAME: 80 Days (Video Game 2014)

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT:

80 Days is a game based on the Jules Verne novel Around the World in Eighty Days. But better, because the world is full of airships and automata! It is available on Windows, Mac, iOS, Android and now Switch.

You play Jean Passepartout, newly employed valet to Phileas Fogg. Fogg has just wagered that he can circumnavigate the globe in 80 Days, and you must quickly pack your bags and leave on the next train to Paris.

The gameplay involves finding new routes onwards, managing money and inventory, valeting, and of course making choices throughout the story. Make it back to London in 80 days or fewer so that Mr Fogg can win his wager. A playthrough is probably about 3-4 hours on average.

Highlights:

-Narrative-driven game with excellent writing and world-building, and a lot of replayability. I really can't emphasize enough how amazing the writing is.

-Set in an extremely rich steampunky universe. It is also a very anti-colonialist narrative. Many different cultures in the game have their own amazing technology.

-Passepartout has the opportunity show interest in men, women, both, or none. There are two major storyline romances (one man, one woman) and a few minor ones here and there. (Personally, I like to play Passepartout as steadfastly in love with Fogg.)

-Lots of different storylines to discover on different playthroughs. Plenty to get deeply invested in.

Ask me anything about it!





WHERE CAN I FIND IT?:

The official site has links to all the places you can buy the game (GOG and Humble seem to have the cheapest non-sale prices in USD).

There are also Let's Plays floating around, but I haven't personally watched any.

[xochiquetzl]

FANDOM NAME: Lyda Morehouse Archangel Protocol/AngeLINK series.



WHAT MAKES IT GREAT:

You mean, aside from the fact that the author is a Yuletide pinch-hitter? ;) (Seriously! she's super fanfic friendly and might link to your story on her author page.)

This book series won awards and stuff, back in the day. The publisher just didn't promote them very well, in my opinion. Maybe they were afraid of offending people?

So, picture Cyberpunk. Like, MS-DOS/Windows 3.1 era cyberpunk. Yeah? But with VR and all that good stuff.

Okay, now put Judaism/Christianity/Islam and a fundamentalist dystopia into your Cyberpunk. Like, literal angels, and also virtual Internet angels that may or may not be real angels, too. All three religions are on equal footing here, so it's not Yo Mama's Abrahamic Religion unless yo mama happens to be very liberal or a UU. ;) So it's kindasorta religious fanfic, only, you know, not sacrilegious/disrespectful/proselyting? She's basically playing with the mythology in a really interesting way. More on this below. (The dystopia part is that you have to be a member of an approved organized religion to get LINK access, and all business happens on the LINK.)

Hey! You got chocolate in my peanut butter! You got peanut butter on my chocolate! You got Cyberpunk on my religious fanfic! You got religious fanfic on my Cyberpunk! Two great tastes that taste great together!

So if you're, like, scratching your head and saying, "I dunno, Xochi, I was raised _______ and I didn't like it and I'm not sure I would like these books," consider this: So, in the first book we have the Archangel Michael, who's basically a hot Italian cop (and the "Christian" angel, although he's perfectly happy in a yarmulke speaking Hebrew at a Passover seder, too). We also have the Archangel Gabriel, only he's a Muslim African who prefers to go by Jibril, with "There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is his prophet" tattooed between his eyes. There's also the Archangel Uriel, who is Asian, Buddhist, and transgender and prefers to go by Ariel. Oh, and Satan, here known as Morningstar, is hot red-headed bi Eurotrash and a sympathetic POV character in later books.

Mortal characters:

Deirdre McMannus. Tough girl excommunicated (so offline) Catholic Private Investigator with a soft spot for hot guys.
Mouse: Egyptian hacker upon whom I have a massive crush, especially in later books. Plays a game of cat and mouse (see what I did there?) with Deirdre, upon whom he has a massive crush.
Emmeline McNaughton: Our dystopia's version of Interpol: the Inquisition. Cyborg, Priest, investigator, and opera fan.
There are also two super cool lesbian hackers, Rebekah and Thystle, and a delightful Japanese Thrash Polka star named Mai.

And wonderful AI characters:

Page: Mouse's AI, based on Mouse. Adorable. ♥ Spends a lot of book 2 learning how to Human, which is one of my favorite tropes. High sass quotient. :D
The Dragon: Japanese AI, programmed by a lonely kid in a Yakuza hacker creche.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?

The hardcopies are tragically out of print (except for the latest one), but because the rights have reverted to the author you can get ebooks at Wizard's Tower and audiobooks at Audible.

Even if you don't offer to write it, consider picking up ebooks and audiobooks and checking it out. The author is super awesome and so are the books, which deserve more attention. ♥

[hamsterwoman]

FANDOM NAME: Sophos "Cybersecurity Evolved" billboards
WHAT MAKES IT GREAT:



I saw a billboard version of this ad on my morning commute, and I still have no idea what this has to do with cybersecurity, but I can't help but admire this guy's sense of style and choice of location. And then it turned out there were more of these! This woman, with her makeup umsmudged and her scarf artfully unfurled by tornadoes. This lady, who coordinates her outdoor office decor with the surrounding glaciers (icebergs?). This fellow, who must have SO MUCH SAND in his keyboard and his hair. (There are actually at least five of these, according to page 7 of this PDF, but I've not come across or been able to find the last one. I think it's a volcano lady? Let me know if you've seen her!)

I love these billboards, because they look like something you'd find on the cover of an urban fantasy novel. But what is going on with these people? Are they cyberwizards who are able to hack the weather? Agents of some mysterious hi-tech office who are our final shield against nefarious weather wizards? Are they all on the same team, or representatives of rival powers? There are so many interesting possibilities, and I feel like this bunch is a cool group of characters to act them out.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): Airports and transit hubs, in my experience, but also in some places online.

Some more shots of the characters from various ads/billboards -- some of these give better close-ups, looks at what theyre wearing, or their surroundings.
1) Woman surrounded by ice: 1
2) Woman surrounded by tornadoes: 1, 2
3) Man surrounded by stormy sea: 1, 2, 3, 4
4) Man surrounded by sandstorm: 1

[geckoholic]

Ohh yes, that seems VERY relevant to my interests.

[xochiquetzl]

FANDOM NAME: Zombies, Run!

>

Yes, it's a Running App. Part phone game, part podcast, part exercise app, this app includes a guest appearance by Margaret Atwood.

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT:

The writing is really good! Seriously, so many feels while you're out running!

LGBTQIA representation. (They have an Ace character who is obviously in a romantic relationship. Do you know how rare that is?) Canon gay and lesbian relationships. Ethnically and spiritually diverse people working together to survive the apocalypse. (The Hijabi character has, if I recall correctly, three cool men interested in her over the course of the various seasons.) Strong women characters, and a good male/female balance. And how many running apps include a differently-abled character? (He's one of the radio boyfriends.)

Sam Yao, the radio operator, is adorable.

The creators are fanfic and fanart friendly!

Most people writing in this fandom follow the app's convention of never explicitly giving the player character (that's you, if you're running with the app) a specific name, race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. Your name is Runner Five, or Five for short. Some people make Five a deaf/mute character in fics because Five has no lines in the game (because you don't have a script while you're running). None of that is required, of course, but it might be a fun challenge. It might also be fun to write this fandom in second person.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?

On the Apple or Google Play store.

[staygame]

FANDOM NAME: 3 Will Be Free (สามเราต้องรอด)

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT:
3 Will Be Free is a Thai drama centered around a trio of (semi) strangers—Mew, Neo, and Shin—on the run from the mafia. There's suspense! Romance! Revenge! The best portrayal of a trans character I've seen out of any Thai dramas I've watched! A large man in ill-fitting t-shirts! Heartbreak! Two of the main side characters (Mae and Ter) are also fantastic. The show just finished with ten episodes and it is officially available with English subtitles on YouTube from the GMMTV channel. The last episode isn't subbed as of the time of this comment but will be soon. Check out the trailer here.

(Content notes: Minor and major character deaths, so many guns, attempted rape and other instances of sexual harassment, transphobia and discussions/portrayal of gender reassignment surgery, and sex while under the influence of drugs. If you have any questions about any of these warnings or specific episodes, please feel free to PM me or comment on DW.)

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): YouTube playlist. Like I said, it's subbed in English (except for the latest episode for now) but there may also be other languages available for at least some of the episodes.

[ninety6tears]

FANDOM NAME: Under the Skin - Michel Faber



Under The Skin is a novel by Michel Faber. If you've only heard of or seen the very loose 2013 adaptation with Scarlett Johansson, you know maybe a handful of concepts from the book, but they do both belong to the category of strange and slowly contemplative science fiction and probably appeal to similar tastes. It's one of those stories that for many is best experienced with as few spoilers as possible so I'll try to break it down in two ways.

The vague synopsis: The main character is an outsider who spends her days driving around Scotland picking up male hitchhikers she considers to be sub-human, parsing through conversation whether anyone would be likely to report their disappearance and then deciding whether to abduct them. The essential purpose of this occupation goes unmentioned for many pages. But throughout the course of the story her status as lower class is heavily emphasized and we learn that she has made gruesome sacrifices for the very little power she has, and even with limited freedom to do so may come to have a better understanding towards her victims.

The semi-spoiler version/what makes it great: Isserley, an alien, was sent to Earth from a bleak life on her home planet when she volunteered, for lack of better job opportunities, to collect humans (referred to as "vodsels") which are becoming a food trend among their species. She comes from a quadrupedal species that sounds somewhat canine if not equine in appearance, and this occupation required her to undergo extreme surgery and hair removal which makes her only just pass as human. The subterranean factory where her people stay hidden on Earth is eventually paid a visit by Amlis Vess, a relative of the meat corporation's owner who considers it immoral to eat intelligent animals.

While the general plot has some very gory elements with a potential for shock value, Faber is so restrained in how he immerses us in Isserley's perspective that the story feels grounded in our world, often in disturbing ways but also with moments of surprising warmth and awe. One fascinating choice is in how Isserley's species are only referred to (as if in translation) as humans, while the human beings they consider food are "vodsels" (probably a reference to "voedsel" in Dutch). There is also the linguistic paradox when Isserley insists only human beings are capable of certain things, listing a few concepts that aren't translatable in any Earth language.

Isserley is a stubborn, menacing yet sympathetic character, and a significant difference from the film version is that the anti-heroine (for lack of a better term) is not exactly a honeypot. On the contrary, it's a crucial part of her development that she was once beautiful enough to earn favors from the privileged on her home world, but a horrific amount of surgery has transformed her into a maimed creature that could only be obscurely attractive to a human and is so foreign as to be grotesque to her own people. Overall, her physical and social condition is extremely isolated, as if she no longer belongs to either world. Despite being initially resentful of the attractive socialite Amlis Vess, she becomes emotionally vulnerable around him because he doesn't treat her with the distant pity she gets from the abattoir workers.

[ex_gwenynnefydd424]

FANDOM NAME: Rosemary and Thyme



WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Rosemary and Thyme is a lovely little murder mystery series set in the late 1990s. If you like Poirot mysteries, you'll probably like this one as it's a similar theme. You follow Rosemary Boxer and Laura Thyme, who become self-employed gardeners after the men in their lives decide to be sexist (Rosemary punches her former boss and Laura throws a rock through her ex's window because of it). But every time they rattle off in Rosemary's beat up landrover to do up someone's garden, a body turns up and they end up investigating.

It's sweet, it's lovely, it's got examples of early 00s feminism, and Laura and Rosemary are essentially married.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): It's currently available via Amazon's Britbox service.

[meme]

FANDOM NAME: The Craft Sequence by Max Gladstone (5 books in a non-chronological sequence, one new one)

Set in the same universe with some characters from the books, but otherwise standalone, are two (brief) choose-your-own-adventure games:

• Choice of the Deathless -- in which you play a fledgeling attorney at a magical law firm and have to claw your way up the ranks (and pay off your student loans. so very many loans)


• The City's Thirst -- in which you play the employee of a magical water corporation trying to figure out what's interfering with the city's water supply

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Imagine a world whose currency is soulstuff -- where it can be traded, banked, generated by acts of faith, or drawn from the stars. Now imagine that the gods used to be the central banks of this world. Now imagine that wizards decided to overthrow the gods, and succeeded. Then imagine the wizards realized the world actually needs a functioning economy of soulstuff to continue existing stably, said 'fuck' collectively, and had to found their own corporations.

This very bad summary underlies what's a very fun concept, which is basically: magic lawyers, if the practice of law had the ability to reshape the fabric of the world. The books in my opinion can be read in pretty much any order, though the first published one (Three Parts Dead) will always be my favorite. The standard fantasy risks (death by monsters, scheming wizards, magic going fucking sideways and blowing you out of existence) are all still present, but it's merged and blended with problems of urban infrastructure (imagine if Las Vegas's water supply depended on a magical treaty?), fraud investigation (what if a major bank just collapsed and you have to figure out who's responsible, except the god is a bank?) and more in a way that feels intrinsically different from 'It's like [Real City] but with vampires/werewolves/fae/etc' types of urban fantasy. And don't get me wrong -- I love urban fantasy. But this scratches a pretty different itch.

In this series, if you're sufficiently magical enough, you shed your flesh and end up a walking skeleton fueled entirely by magic, called a Deathless King. If you've ever had dreams of shedding your mortal flesh prison for a slick set of bones instead, this might be the series for you.

Finally, it has a pretty diverse cast -- I won't get into it too much, but I think it's one of the fantasy series that gets fantasy!POC right, in that you can clearly identify that the character is a member of a minority group in the context of the world, and the narrative engages with how that shapes them (ie. one character who's from a group indigenous to an area that an urban city was built on realistically struggles with their rejection/reconnection to the traditional faith and beliefs they were raised with, considering they work for the corporation that goes against those values; another character is trans, and the understanding from that experience meant makes them damn good at their job). Characters of all sexualities/orientations are present and visible. For the CYOA games, you can explicitly choose to "play as male or female, gay or straight, dead or alive (or both).

Anyway, there's a lot going on. I think this might appeal to fans of Discworld -- although the series generally takes itself much more seriously, there's some meta stuff that touches on ideas on humanity and immortality and greater cosmic justice brought up in the Death books, Small Gods, and even some of the procedural aspects and simple humanity of the Watch books.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional):
The books are generally available where all eBooks are sold -- I'll note that there's an omnibus edition that collects the first five which may be cheaper than buying all of them independent of each other.

The CYOA games are available on various app stores, but you can also play it free (for limited saving/replay ability) online at the Choice of Games Website. If you're not sure the writing or worldbuilding will be your cup of tea, I recommend checking these out first.
Choice of the Deathless
The City's Thirst

[sailorhathor]

FANDOM NAME: Nirvana & The Foo Fighters (RPF)
WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Great music, great people, makes great fic! Two of the best grunge/hard rock bands ever full of attractive men and all the emotional background drama you could hope for to keep things interesting.
WHERE CAN I FIND IT?: Wherever you buy music. You can also watch interviews with both bands on YouTube.

Click the pic below to go to my pimping post!

[tehhumi]

FANDOM NAME: Doctrine of Labyrinths - Sarah Monette

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT:
Felix Harrowgate used to be a prostitute, then was magically bound to an evil wizard, but has finally gotten free (or so he thinks). Now he's a wizard in the court of King Stephen, and sleeping with Stephen's brother. Life is good for the most beautiful, most flamboyant, most magically powerful wizard in the city.
Meanwhile, Mildmay the Fox is a cat burglar and former assassin. He's hired to steal some gems that he hopes are only so incredibly expensive to be worth murdering for, but turn out to be dark magic.
Then the evil wizard comes back and uses his bond to Felix to break magic for the whole city,driving Felix crazy in the process due to magical backlash.
Over four books, Felix and Mildmay discover that they're long lost brothers, fix magic, rescue people from jail, cross the continent a couple times, break magic again, fix it again, find and lose love, accidentally uncover sinister plots, and avoid talking about their issues.
The books are written in first person with a rotating narrator, so we get to see inside the heads Felix, Mildmay, Mehitabell Parr (an actress/governess with a secret of her own), and Kay Brightmore (a defeated revolutionary). All our protagonists are used to having no one but themself to rely on, and the books are about them slowly learning to open up. The books read like fanifction to me - and I say that a high compliment - in that the focus is primarily on the characters relationships, and the emotional development of characters as individuals. There's a lot dancing around or blundering through power dynamics, both mundane and magically enforced.

Tl;dr: Two long-lost traumatized siblings reunite and solve ancient creepy magic mysteries, which is easier than finding a healthy coping mechanism.

Warnings for many things, though they all handled really well (as serious things that can cause lasting trauma but people can eventually move past): past child prostitution, on-page rape, unsafe BDSM, suicidal ideation, incest, prostitution, child slavery, murder, a delusional PoV-character, torture, death as an ongoing Theme
The series does have a happy ending, and each individual book has at least a hopeful ending.

Book 1:



WHERE CAN I FIND IT?(optional): The series is sadly out of print, but there are a large number of used copies available, and of course your local library!

[scansionictus]

"...you had better believe that I was the one who sent them."


FANDOM NAME: Batwoman (2017), DC Comics

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: There is so much to love about this series. At its core is a cast of incredibly compelling women who range from "hero with a tortured past" to "villain who would kill for the woman she loves." Although Kate Kane (Batwoman) has several potential love interests in this series (Julia Pennyworth, Renee Montoya), the primary focus is on the love triangle between herself, Safiyah (the "Mother of Warlords") and Tahani ("The Knife"). The push-pull of this triangle is spurred by jealousy and possessiveness, and it unfolds beautifully throughout the series.

The series is incredibly well-written and one of the most consistent titles I've read with respect to pacing and characterisation. It's also fairly self-contained and does an excellent job of establishing Kate's character, so it's perfect for people who are new to Batwoman, DC, or comic books in general. The run is complete and at 18 issues, it's fairly short and could be easily read over a few days. Finally the art is absolutely stunning, and the use of colour and motifs make it feel very cohesive, even for issues designed by different artists.

WHERE CAN I FIND IT?: You can find all 18 issues here (I recommend adblock), or they are available for purchase on Amazon.